The emergence of Op art and kinetic art in the early 1960s evinced a strong interest in objectivity and in scientific experiment. Fascinated by the physical laws of light and optics, a whole generation of artists devoted themselves to exploring visual phenomena and principles of perception. Probing the possibilities of optical illusion, Victor Vasarely, Bridget Riley, François Morellet, Julio Le Parc, Gianni Colombo, and others deliberately aimed at producing visual irritations. In large-format paintings, objects, and environments, they caused more than the observers eye to move. Their works immerse their viewers in color, plunge them in the infinity of mirrors, or offer them a poetic play with light. The interaction between the work and the viewer fulfills itself in installations that not only entail physical effects in the form of afterimages, vibrating colors, or flickering light but affect the entire consciousness.

Op art plays with the viewers sensory premises. It is an art which deliberately demands too much of the eye. Overloading the human visual organ results in contrast effects, halations, suggestions of movement in space, simultaneous color effects turning black-and-white pictures into color images (where the viewers perception alone provides the color). The strategies of Op art prevent an adaptation of the eye and insert themselves between seeing and understanding. It makes us see things that are not even there and thus provides a critique of consciousness. A process of seeing that stabilizes itself and can never be perfect conveys the idea that pure seeing must remain an illusion. Speaking of optical effects describes the issue only superficially. The approach aims at an experience of the limits of perception that clearly goes beyond seeing, at becoming aware of ones sensory and psychological apparatus a process which not only includes the body but also comprises the intellectual dimensions of reception.

In the mid-1960s, Op art flourished in both Europe and America with centers not merely in Western Europe and the USA but also in Eastern Europe and Latin America. Thus, Op art is one of the few movements in art with a global dissemination including the most diverse political and cultural contexts a fact not least resulting from the universal character of its artistic means and furthered by a form of perception which, first of all, requires only little apart from an open eye. Op art does not seem to depend on preliminary knowledge and thus grants a spontaneous experience of the artworks presented.

The exhibition Op Art at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt offers a major survey of its most important positions without distinguishing between two-dimensional pictures and three-dimensional objects. The argument for exploring Op art and kinetic art together is primarily based on the observation that this art is something that cannot be pinned down. Only an overview of the various media can disclose the concept of a form of painting encompassing space, embracing the environment, and only establishing itself in between the picture and its viewer. Op art and kinetic art are interested in the idea of pictures which affect the viewer by combining mechanical and optical movements and not focusing on the existence of form or material. Distinct aspects overlap: the mechanical, actual movements, the optical movements resulting from changes of the viewers position, apparent movements due to perception effects such as a flickering between the lines, and, finally, perceptual movements through reverse effects in the picture. In addition, the different phenomena blend into each other. Frequently, the hybrid character of the movements form already springs from the immaterial nature of three-dimensional visual objects such as Jesús Rafael Sotos Vibration Structures or Yaacov Agams Tableaus transformables convertible pictures that the viewer is called upon to reconstruct with his or her hands.

The presentation centers on large-format pictures and extensive installations since visual effects of works that are aimed at integrating the viewer depend on size to a high degree. The hypnotic and pulsating effects increase when they occupy large parts of the visitors field of view; the artistic means employed by Bridget Riley, Richard Anuszkiewicz, or François Morellet certainly mark a peak in this respect. The dimensions that conquer the viewers entire optical field, as it were, sometimes turn into an overpowering strategy (a perceptive compulsion). The Op artists large-size paintings, environments, and installations not only set the observers eye in motion: the interaction between the work and the viewer a central topos of contemporary art culminates in installations that affect the whole being and not just produce physical effects in the form of unexpected afterimages, color vibrations, or flickering light. The interaction between picture and viewer unfolds the background for a significant new aesthetic approach: Op art replaces thinking in objects by thinking in spaces.

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